Trump Pals Pushed Nuke Firm That Wanted to Undercut Protections Against a Saudi Bomb
Two of President Trump’s closest advisers pushed hard for a firm trying to circumvent the safeguards meant to keep Saudi Arabia from building a nuclear weapon.
That’s one of the many conclusions of a year-long investigation by the House Oversight Committee, which found that Former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and former inaugural committee chair Tom Barrack worked to enrich themselves and their colleagues in the nuclear energy sector. A centerpiece of the effort: helping American companies land contracts in Saudi Arabia—at least in one case, without the guardrails needed to keep the Saudis from making weapons-grade nuclear fuel.
Flynn and Barrack used their relationships with the White House—as well as with officials from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Russia—to advance their personal interests and the interests of executives at the nuclear firm IP3. The CEO of the firm, Admiral Mike Hewitt, began working with Flynn and Barrack in the fall of 2016 in an attempt to influence the incoming Trump administration’s Saudi Arabia policy, according to the House Oversight report. The effort drew in a host of other officials in the Trump administration, including Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
“The Trump Administration has virtually obliterated the lines normally separating government policymaking from corporate and foreign interests,” the report states. “Documents show the Administration’s willingness to let private parties with close ties to the President wield outsized influence over U.S. policy towards Saudi Arabia.”
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